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Slate takes a look at the property claims over the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, venerated as the site of the crucifixion, burial, and resurrection of Jesus:

Under an 1852 mandate,
the care of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is shared by no less than
six Christian denominations: the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic,
Roman Catholic, Coptic, Ethiopian, and Syriac Orthodox churches. The
Holy Sepulchre’s edifice is carefully divided into sections, with some
commonly shared, while others belong strictly to a particular sect. A
set of complicated rules governs the transit rights of the other groups
through each section on any given day, and some of the sections of the
church remain hotly disputed. Arguments and fistfights over territory
and boundaries are not uncommon.

One such area is a
small section of the roof which is disputed between the Copts and
Ethiopians. At least one Coptic monk at any given time sits there on a
chair placed on a particular spot to express this claim. On a stifling
summer day in 2002, a monk moved his chair eight inches to find shade.
This was interpreted as a hostile act and violation of boundaries, and
11 were hospitalized after the fight that ensued.

The Church of the Holy
Sepulchre’s “immovable ladder” is a centuries-old symbol of this
extreme territoriality. During the early 1800s, a man belonging to an
unknown sect placed the ladder on a ledge against an exterior
second-floor wall of the church. Due to the imposition of the status quo
and the fear of inciting violence, no one has dared touch it since.

Excepting, of course,
the time in 1997 when a mischievous tourist named Andy plucked it from
the ledge and hid it behind an altar, where it remained undiscovered for
weeks. The ladder has since been put back into its “appropriate” spot.